Saturday, May 15, 2004

I was hauling a patient around yesterday who outweighed me by a good fifty pounds. After I'd repositioned him and gotten him all comfy and cozy, I went outside to discuss his plan of care with his family. As is usual in these situations, the conversation turned to nursing as a job.

"Gee whiz," said one of the man's relatives, "it must be nice just to have to work three or four days a week, and get the rest of the week off. My sister's a nurse, and it seems like she's never at work."

I was on my third of three shifts in a row yesterday, with the usual heavy (both physically and care-wise) patients. I looked at him narrowly and asked what he meant by "never at work."

"Well, you know, she has all this time off, and she works those twelve hours and then just goes home. Sounds like a great job to me."

Go on, buddy. Make me peevish. Sure, I might work "only" three or four days a week, but those days are a combination of hard physical labor--the hardest I've ever done, including working in a book warehouse--and mental strain. If you ask any honest nurse what she or he does on the first day s/he has off after a long run, s/he'll tell you "I go from the bed to the couch and back, and maybe manage a load of laundry."

Spoiled Rich Boy, on the other hand, works eight to ten hours a day sitting behind a desk. For him, a workout at the end of the day is a nice interlude, not another hour and a half of hell.

...and then piss me off again...

Our hospital does not celebrate Nurses' Week. Instead, we have "Hospital Week."

Must be a great budget savings, that one.

This is one of those "don't get me started" things that I simply can't talk about without getting all het up. Nurses' Week isn't all about manicures and massages--though, honestly, it would be nice to have a five-minute backrub over lunch. If we get lunch that week, that is. It's also an opportunity to recognize the scientific and psychological contributions we make every single day to the field and to related fields.

But no, we get "Hospital Week." And a calculator on Friday, to show what Valued Members of the Health Care Team we are.

This one time, at band camp...

The longer I'm single the nerdier I get. A patient wrote a thank-you note the other day that contained a quote from a "Star Trek: The Next Generation" episode. Not only did I know that, I knew who said it, the context, and to whom.

It may be time to start getting the J. Crew catalog, just so I have something other than science and technology on the brain.

Put me on top or change the odds...

I went to bed hoping Man A would call. He didn't. Of course. But still.

As nerdy as I am, and as unconvinced of the possibility of a decent relationship with anybody, I kind of hoped for a "SHANE!!" (or "STELLA!!") moment. Hopeless romantic, that's me.

The thing that bugs me most about The Debacle (the breakup with Erstwhile Hub) is that he let me go so easily. That man had my stuff packed and me moved in four days. Amazing.

Oh, well. The anniversary of The Debacle will come and go and I'll start on Year Two of the new life.

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